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A Manuscript copy of :

Short-writing, the most easie, exact, lineal, and speedy method that hath ever been obtained, or taught. Composed by Theophilus Metcalfe, author and professor of the said art. The last edition. With a new table for shortning of words. Which book is able to make the practitioner perfect without a teacher. As many hundreds in this city and elsewhere, that are able to write sermons word for word, can from their own experience testifie. A young man, that lately lived in Cornhill, learned so well by this book that he wrote out all the Bible in this character.

This manuscript is bound in full modern calf. This copybook manuscript is taken from the last edition published by Metcalfe. The entire work is done with remarkable calligraphy. This is a rare copy manuscript item with complementary addendum on Italian Book-Keeping.

Theophilus Metcalfe (bap. 1610 – c.1645) was an English stenographer. He invented a shorthand system that became popular, in particular, in New England, where it was used to record the Salem witch trials.[1]Metcalfe was baptised in Richmond, Yorkshire, and was the tenth child of Matthew Metcalfe and his wife Maria Taylor; Thomas Taylor (1576–1632) was his mother’s brother. A professional writer and teacher of shorthand, Metcalfe in 1645 resided in the London parish of St Katharine’s by the Tower. He died that year or early in 1646, when his widow assigned rights to reissue the book of his system.

Metcalfe published a stenographic system very much along the lines of Thomas Shelton’s Tachygraphy. The first edition of his work was entitled Radio-Stenography, or Short Writing and is supposed to have been published in 1635. A so-called sixth edition appeared at London in 1645. It was followed in 1649 by A Schoolmaster to Radio-Stenography, explaining all the Rules of the said Art, by way of Dialogue betwixt Master and Scholler, fitted to the weakest capacities that are desirous to learne this Art. Many editions of the system appeared under the title of Short Writing: the most easie, exact, lineall, and speedy Method that hath ever yet been obtained or taught by any in this Kingdome.

2. 902G Thomas Shelton 1601-1650

Zeiglographia. or A New art of never before published. More easie, exact, short, and speedie than any here to fore. Invented & composed By Thomas Shelton Author and teacher of ye said art Allowed by Authoritie.

London: Printed by M.[ary] S.[immons] And are to be sold at the Author’s house in Bore’s Head Court by Cripple-Gate, 1659. $2,500

Octavo 5 1/2 X 3 1/4 inches . A4, B-D8, E4. The first edition is reported to have been printed in 1649, the Address “To the reader” dated: Sept. 10. 1649 , But the 1650 edition is titled Zeiglographia; New art of short-writing never before published.

Counting the unrecorded first, this would be the fifth edition. “A re-issue of the 1654 edition with the same title page except for the alteration of the date to 1659.”
This copy is in a well-used state. The leaves are all slightly stained and dog-eared. Paper repairs have corrected many of the curling corners. It has its original calf binding but could use a rebacking.

The Shelton short hand systems were used by Samuel Pepys, Thomas Jefferson and Sir Isaac Newton. “Thomas Shelton [a] stenographer, descended from an old Norfolk family, was born in 1601. It is probable that he began life as a writing-master, and that he was teaching and studying shorthand before he was nineteen, for in 1649 he speaks of having had more than thirty years’ study and practice of the art. He produced his first book, called ‘Short Writing, the most exact method,’ in 1626, but no copy of this is known to exist. In 1630 he brought out the second edition enlarged, which was ‘sould at the professors house in Cheapside, over against Bowe church.’ He is styled ‘author and professor of the said art.’ Another edition was published in London in 1636. In February 1637-8 he published his most popular work, called ‘Tachygraphy. The most exact and compendious methode of Shorthand Swift Writing that hath ever yet beene published by any … Approved by both Universities.’ It was republished in 1642, and in the same year Shelton brought out a catechism or ‘Tutor to Tachygraphy,’ the author’s residence being then in Old Fish Street. In 1645 he was teaching his ‘Tachygraphy’ at ‘the professors house, in the Poultry, near the Church.’ Editions of this work continued to be published down to 1710.“Shelton, who was a zealous puritan, published in 1640, ‘A Centurie of Similies,’ and in the same year he was cited to appear before the court of high commission, but the offense with which he was charged is not specified. In 1649 his second system of stenography appeared under the title of ‘Zeiglographia, or a New Art of Short Writing never before published, more easie, exact, short, and speedie than heretofore. Invented and composed by Thomas Shelton, being his last thirty years study.’ It is remarkable that the alphabet differs from the tachygraphy of 1641 in every respect excepting the letters q, r, v, and z. It is, in fact, an entirely original system. On its appearance Shelton was still living in the Poultry, and there he probably died in or before October 1650. The book continued to be published down to 1687.“Many subsequent writers copied Shelton or published adaptations of his best known system of ‘tachygraphy,’ which was extensively used and highly popular. Old documents between 1640 and 1700, having shorthand signs on them, may often be deciphered by Shelton’s characters, though the practice of adding arbitrary signs sometimes proves a stumbling block. It was in this system that Pepys wrote his celebrated Diary, and not, as frequently stated, in the system erroneously attributed to Jeremiah Rich.“An adaptation of the system to the Latin language appeared under the title of ‘Tachygraphia, sive exactissima et compendiosissima breviter scribendi methodus,’ London, 1660, 16mo. This adaptation was described and illustrated in Gaspar Schott’s ‘Technica Curiosa,’ published at Nuremberg in 1665. It was slightly modified by Charles Aloysius Ramsay, who published it in France as his own.“About 1660 there appeared in London, in 64mo, ‘The whole book of Psalms in meeter according to that most exact & compendious method of short writing composed by Thomas Shelton (being his former hand) approved by both universities & learnt by many thousands.’ It is uncertain whether Shelton’s or Rich’s Psalms were published first. They appeared nearly together; both were engraved by T. Cross; and the size of each is 2.5 x 1.5 inches.” (quoted from the DNB)

Oνομασικὸν βραχύ (Onomastikon brachy) sive. Nomenclatura brevis Anglo-Latino-Græca. In usum scholæ Westmonasteriensis. Per F.G. Editio duodecima emendata. Together with Examples of the five declensions of nouns; with the words in propria quæ maribus and quæ genus reduced to each declension_

London : printed by J. Macock, for Richard Royston, book-seller to His most Sacred Majesty 1672 $2,200

Octavo, 6 3/4 X 4 1/2 inches. A-E8 This copy is bound in full original sheep cords worn spine torn but sewing and binding still holding! Gregory, born about 1625, was a native of Woodstock, Oxfordshire. He was educated at Westminster under Busby, who, as he afterwards said, was not only a master but a father to him, and in 1641 was elected to a scholarship at Trinity College, Cambridge, graduating M.A. in 1648. He returned to Westminster School as usher till he was appointed head-master of the grammar school at Woodstock. He was a successful teacher, and numbered among his pupils several sons of noble families. An ardent royalist he was chosen to preach the thanksgiving sermon for the Restoration at St. Mary’s, Oxford, 27 May 1660, and afterwards published it under the title of ‘David’s Return from Banishment.’ He also published ‘Votivum Carolo, or a Welcome to his sacred Majesty Charles II from the Master and Scholars of Woodstock School,’ a volume of English and Latin verses composed by Gregory and his pupils. Shortly afterwards he became head-master of a newly founded school at Witney, Oxfordshire, and 22 Sept. 1661 he was incorporated D.D. of Oxford University from St. Mary Hall. He was appointed a chaplain to the king, and in 1671 was presented by Earl Rivers to the living of Hambleden, Buckinghamshire. He. kept this post till his death in 1707. He was buried in the church, where a tablet was erected to his memory._ This book consists of Parallel vocabulary : Then Examples of the five declensions of nouns; followed by Examples of Adjectives. _ Not in Wing see G1899E a different printer According to the ESTC there are 28 editions printed between 1651 and 1769 listing only eleven copies in the US, This copy is listed with only one copy at the Westminster School (where else could you expect?!)

4*** 670G Edmund Gurnay ±1648

The demonstration of Antichrist. By Edmund Gurnay, Bach. Theol. p. of Harpley Norfolke

London:Printed by I[ohn] B[eale] for Iames Boler, and are to be sold at the signe of the Marigold in Pauls Churchyard 1631 $2,900

Octavo, 5 1/4 X 3 1/4 inches. First edition A12,B5{ lacking b6 Blank}. This copy is bound in calf boards rebacked. Gurney matriculated at Queens’ College, Cambridge, on 30 October 1594, and graduated B.A. in 1600. He was elected Norfolk fellow of Corpus Christi College in 1601, proceeded to M.A. in 1602, and B.D. in 1609. In 1607 he was suspended from his fellowship for not being in orders, but was reinstated by the vice-chancellor. In 1614 he left Cambridge, on being presented to the rectory of Edgefield, Norfolk, which he held till 1620, when he received that of Harpley, Norfolk. Gurney was inclined to puritanism, as appears from his writings. On one occasion he was cited to appear before the bishop for not using a surplice, and on being told he was expected to always wear it, ‘came home, and rode a journey with it on.’ He further made his citation the occasion for publishing his tract vindicating the Second Commandment. Thomas Fuller, who was personally acquainted with him, says: ‘He was an excellent scholar, could be humourous, and would be serious as he was himself disposed. His humours were never prophane towards God or injurious towards his neighbours.’ Gurney died in 1648. Gurney was married, and apparently had a son called Protestant (d. 1624—monument at Harpley). DNB STC (2nd ed.), 12529 [Stationer’s Register: Entered 29 January [1631.]

Seven Sermons: Viz. I. Of the Unpardonable Sin against the Holy Ghost: or, the Sin Unto Death. II. The Saint’s Duty and Exercise: in Two Parts. Being an Exhortation to, and Directions for Prayer. III. The Accepted Time and Day of Salvation. IV. The End of Time, and Beginning of Eternity. V. Joshua’s Resolution to Serve the Lord. VI. The Way to Heaven Made Plain. VII. The Future State of Man: or, a Treatise of the Resurrection. By Robert Russel, at Wadhurst, in Sussex

Boston:Reprinted by John Allen, for John Eliot, at his shop in Orange-Street,1718 $1,600

Duodecimo, 6 X 3.25 inches. A1 (lacking A2-A5) A6 B1&2, B5&6, CI6, K1&2,(lacking K3&4)L1&2 (lacking L3&4)L5&6, N1-6, O1 (lacking O2-5) O6, P1 (Lacking P2-5 (P6 blank) This book is bound in sheep over scabord and sewn on two leather sewing supports , a typical early American binding. All Editions of this book are quite rare, there are only two copies of the Boston editions both at American Antiquarian Society Worcester. Of Russell, I could find very little, yet he was immensely popular, especially in the colonies being reprinted in Boston in 1701, 1727 & 1728. There is no doubt that Russell’s style of sermonizing upon sin met with the Mather’s approval. All early editions are quite rare. Estc Locates only one copy at The American Antiquarian Society .

6. 606G John Reading 1588-1667

Dauids soliloquie. Containing many comforts for afflicted mindes. As they were deliuered in sundry sermons at Saint Maries in Douer. By Io: Reading.

Printed [by John Legat] for Robert Allot, and are to be sold at his shop in Saint Pauls Church-yeard at the signe of the Greyhound :1627 $950

Octavo, 5 1/2 X 3 inches . A-V X .Leaves A1, A11, A12 are blank. With additional engraved title page (plate), signed: F. Hulsius invenit et sculps·. This copy is bound in original soiled vellum. Reading matriculated at Magdalen Hall, Oxford, on 4 May 1604, and graduated B.A. on 17 October 1607. He took holy orders about 1614 and was chaplain to Edward la Zouche, 11th Baron Zouche of Haringeworth, Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports and governor of Dover Castle. After preaching at Dover many sermons before his patron, Reading was appointed minister of St. Mary’s on 2 December 1616, at the request of the parishioners, . He secured a position of influence in the town, and subsequently became chaplain to Charles I . Although his sermons advocated Puritan principles, he supported the king’s cause in the English Civil War. In 1642 his study at Dover was plundered by parliamentary soldiers, and he was imprisoned for nineteen months. By direction of Charles I, and William Laud, Reading was made the rector of Chartham, Kent, on 27 January 1643. The House of Commons declined to sanction Reading’s institution, and appointed Edward Corbett. Laud refused to abandon Reading. A prebend in Canterbury which was bestowed on Reading at the same time brought him no advantage. In July 1644 he was presented by Sir William Brockman to the living of Cheriton, Kent, and in the same year Reading was appointed by the Westminster Assembly to be one of nine commissioned to write annotations on the New Testament. Shortly after 1645, on the discovery of a plot for the capture of Dover Castle by the royalists, he was arrested by command of Major John Boys, and hurried to Dover Castle, and next day to Leeds Castle. There he composed the “Guide to the Holy City.”’ He was at length discharged by the parliamentary committee for Kent, and the restitution of his goods was ordered; but his livings were sequestered. On 8 January 1647 he was a prisoner in the Fleet Prison. On 10 March 1650 he attacked the right of unordained preaching in a public disputation with the baptist Samuel Fisher of Folkestone. Fisher used arguments from Jeremy Taylor’s “Discourse of the Liberty of Prophesying,”’ which Reading had already criticised in print.Reading was restored to his Dover living shortly before the English Restoration of 1660. On 25 May 1660 he presented to Charles II, on his first landing, a large bible with gold clasps, in the name of the corporation of Dover, and made a short speech, which was published as a broadside. He was shortly afterwards restored to Chartham, made canon of the eighth prebend of Canterbury, and reinstituted to Cheriton on 18 July . In October following the university of Oxford conferred on him the degree of D.D. per literas regias. Before August 1662 he resigned the living at Dover. STC (2nd ed.), 20788 Estc Locates Folger and Huntington only.

7***723G Langston, John. 1641-1704

Lusus poeticus Latino-Anglicanus in usum scholarum. Or The more eminent sayings of the Latin poets collected; and for the service of youth in that ancient exercise, commonly called capping of verses, alphabetically digested; and for the greater benefit of young beginners i the Latin tongue, rendred into English. By John Langston teacher of a private grammar-school near Spittle-fields, London .

London : printed for Henry Eversden at the Crown in Cornhil, near the Stocks-market, 1675. $2,400

Octavo, 5 3/4 X 3 3/4 Inches . First edition, 2nd edition in 1679 and 3rd edition in 1688. This copy is bound in full 17th century calf, recently expertly rebacked. This alphabetically arranged compendium of eminent sayings by Latin poets for the service of youth in capping of verses is the work for which Langston is best remembered. He issued a lesser known grammatical work, “Poeseos Graecae Medulla”, in 1679. He published nothing of a religious nature, but issued the following for school purposes: 1. ‘Lusus Poeticus Latino-Anglicanus,’ &c., 1675, 8vo; 2nd edition, 1679, 8vo; 3rd edition, 1688, 12mo (intended as an aid to capping verses). 2. ‘ π . Sive Poese Græcæ Medulla, cum versione Latina,’ &c., 1679, 8vo.” “LANGSTON, JOHN (1641?–1704), independent divine, was born about 1641, according to Calamy. He went from the Worcester grammar school to Pembroke College, Oxford, where he was matriculated as a servitor in Michaelmas term 1655, and studied for some years. Wood does not mention his graduation. At the Restoration in 1660 (when, if Calamy is right, he had not completed his twentieth year) he held the sequestered perpetual curacy of Ashchurch, Gloucestershire, from which be was displaced by the return of the incumbent. He went to London, and kept a private school near Spitalfields. On the coming into force of the Uniformity Act (24 Aug. 1662) he crossed over to Ireland as chaplain and tutor to Captain Blackwell, but returned to London and to school-keeping in 1663. Under the indulgence of 1672 he took out a license, in concert with William Hooke (d. March 1677, aged 77), formerly master of the Savoy, ‘to preach in Richard Loton’s house in Spittle-yard.’ Some time after 1679 he removed into Bedfordshire, where he ministered till, in 1686, he received an invitation from a newly separated congregation of independents, who had hired a building in Green Yard, St. Peter’s parish, Ipswich. Under his preaching a oongregational church of seventeen persons was formed on 12 Oct. 1686. Langston, his wife, and thirty others were admitted to membership on 22 Oct., when a call to the pastorate was given him; he accepted it on 29 Oct., and was set apart by four elders at a solemn fast on 2 Nov. A ‘new chappell’ in Green Yard was opened on 26 June 1687, and the church membership was raised to 123 persons, many of them from neighbouring villages. Calamy says he was driven out of his house, was forced to remove to London, and was there accused of being a jesuit, whereupon he published a successful ‘Vindication.’ The publication is unknown, and Calamy gives no date; the year 1697 has been suggested. Langston’s church-book gives no hint of any persecution, but shows that he was in the habit of paying an annual visit of about three weeks’ duration to London with his wife. He notices the engagement with the French fleet at La Hogue on 19 May 1692, ‘for ye defeat of wh blessed he God,’ and the earthquake on 8 Sept. in the same year. The tone of his ministry was conciliatory ‘towards people of different perswasions.’ In November 1702 Benjamin Glandfield (d. 10 Sept. 1720) was appointed as his assistant. Langston died on 12 Jan. 1704, ‘aetat. 64.’ (DNB). Wing L411; Harvard,Huntington,U of Ill, U of Texas,Yale . Arber’s Term cat. I 213.

Copies – Brit.Isles British Library
Cambridge University King’s College
Durham University Library
National Library of Scotland
National Library of Wales
Nottingham University Library
Oxford University Bodleian Library
Signet Library
The National Trust
Winchester College Fellows Library

8. 635F Covil, Samuel. fl 1680’s Mock poem: or, Whiggs supplication. Part I.Edinburgh : printed by James Watson, and sold at his shop opposite to the Lucken-Booths, 1711 $1,800 Octavo, 5 3/4 X 3 3/4 inches First Edinburgh Edition A-G8, H4. This copy is bound in modern quarter calf. Of Colvil’s personal history nothing is known. His first appearance as a writer is supposed to have been in 1673. A work printed at Edinburgh in that year is extant, entitled “An Historical Dispute of the Papacy and Popish Religion,” which bears to be written by “Sam. Colvil,” but whether this was the same individual who wrote the “Whigs’ Supplication” is not certain. The latter work was published at London, in duodecimo, in the year 1681. It was much read, and has even continued to be read, down to a late period. Samuel Colville, was a poet of considerable reputation. He is described as a gentleman ; * an expression which is perhaps intended to signify that he belonged to no profession ; and his name occurs in a ” bond of provision,” executed by his father on the 5th of May 1643. His popularity as a poet seems at least to have equalled his merit. His ” Whiggs Supplication” was circulated before it appeared in print, and manuscript copies of it are still to be found: it was published in the year 1681, and has passed through several editions. Colville is manifestly an imitator of Butler, but he displays a slender portion of Butler’s wit and humour. The language of his poem was apparently intended for English, but is interspersed with many Scottish words and idioms. ESTC Citation No. T32966 Princeton,UCLA, U of Texas, Yale. Foxon, C308

HAWKINS, HENRY (1571?–1646), jesuit, born in London in 1571 or 1575, was second son of Sir Thomas Hawkins, knt., of Nash Court, Kent, by Anne, daughter and heiress of Cyriac Pettit, of Boughton-under-the-Blean, Kent. John Hawkins [q. v.] and Sir Thomas Hawkins [q. v.] were his brothers. After studying classics in the college of the English Jesuits at St. Omer, he entered the English College at Rome, under the assumed name of Brooke, on 19 March 1608–9. He received minor orders in 1613, was ordained priest about the same time, and, after spending two years in the study of scholastic theology, left for Belgium and entered the Society of Jesus about 1615. A manuscript ‘status’ of the English College at Rome for 1613 says that he was the ‘son of a cavalier, lord of a castle, a man of mature age, intelligent in affairs of government, very learned in the English laws, and that he had left a wife, office, and many other commodities and expectations, to become a priest in the seminaries.’ Hawkins on coming to England was captured and imprisoned. In 1618 he was sent into perpetual exile with eleven other Jesuits, but, like most of his companions, soon returned to this country, where he laboured, principally in the London district, for twenty-five years. He is named among the ‘veterani missionarii’ in the list of Jesuits found among the papers seized in 1628 at the residence of the society in Clerkenwell. In his old age he withdrew to the house of the English tertian fathers at Ghent, where he died on 18 Aug. 1646.

A threefold dialogue, concerning the three chief points in controversy amo[ng] Protestants in our days. Viz. I. Whether the holy scriptures do prove the doctrine of free grace, or free will? II. Whether believers, or infant-baptism, be the ordinance of Christ? III. Whether the seventh, or first day of the week, be the sabbath of the Lord? Deliver’d in a familiar stile, easy for each capacity to understand. By Philotheos London : [s.n.], printed in the year 1708. $1,950

Octavo, 6 1/4 X 4 inches . First and only edition A-F12 Bound in full early sheep. It is a good copy with deckel edges.

No copy in the US only two copies in the UK, All three of Maulden’s books are quite rare, none are represented outside of England.